You’re not a user experience designer if…

The UX field is booming. It seems like the number of user experience practitioners has doubled in the last year — from newbies who’ve just entered the workforce, to mid-career changes, to folks who’ve been doing this all along but finally found out what to call themselves.

It’s incredibly reassuring to finally see a long overdue interest in user experience practice; after all, that’s what many of us have spent our careers fighting for. I started this blog to give greater insight into how we think, how we work, and how we benefit customers and companies alike. I consider myself lucky to be among many professionals who speak at conferences around the world in an effort to bring UX into the mainstream. And it’s working!

There’s just one problem: not everyone calling themselves a user experience designer is actually a user experience designer. Unfortunately the designation isn’t as clear cut as a doctor or a lawyer. Most professions are certified and regulated, so you don’t see impostor behavior often — and when you do, it’s typically in the form of a news article about someone going to jail for fraud. Perhaps more analogously, even those in non-regulated occupations like writers and programmers would have a hard time passing themselves off as such without actually writing or actually programming.

But how does a user experience designer demonstrate their user experience designing? I’m not talking about quality or level of expertise here; I’m merely referring to the veracity, the legitimacy of the title itself.

Regardless of what they choose to call themselves, how can you identify someone who isn’t actually practicing UX at all, who’s only hitching their wagon to a rising star?

You’re not a user experience designer if…

You don’t talk to users. If you design entirely based on intuition without ever gathering intel from a single human being who might at some point in their life come into contact with your business, I’m sorry, but you just aren’t a user experience designer.

You can’t identify your target audience. If asked who your site is intended for and you say anyone and everyone, you are wrong. If a product is designed for everyone, it works for no one. A user experience designer would know that and narrow the target.

You don’t define the problem before trying to solve it. If your boss tells you what to build and you don’t start the project by first determining why — the specific pain point that people are currently experiencing that your product aims to eliminate — you’re a lackey, not a user advocate. Nine times out of ten, understanding the problem changes the solution dramatically.

You can’t articulate your users’ goals. Maybe you kinda get the problem people are having, but unless you can communicate (in your own words) the objectives your target users are trying to accomplish both in their lives and their work, how can you craft a solution that will truly support their efforts?

You design in a vacuum. No user experience designer works alone, so if you are, you aren’t one. Even a UX team of one relies on stakeholders, visual designers, developers, marketers, the guy in the next cubicle , etc. for feedback. A user experience designer knows the product isn’t meant for them, and always tests its effectiveness with other people.

You don’t consider the business objectives. Surprise! If all you want to do is protect the consumer, join the ACLU. A true user experience designer understands their company’s goals just as deeply as they understand their constituents. That allows you to determine which of the constituency’s needs should be addressed by the product, and make a case to the powers that be how doing so will positively impact the business in the long run.

You don’t use UX methods. User interviews, usability tests, personas, scenarios, card sorts, affinity diagrams, concept models, sketches, flow diagrams, sitemaps, wireframes, prototypes, web analytics, A/B tests, the listgoesonandon. If you don’t have a systematic approach for articulating what you learn about your users to others on your team, or even a loose process to iterate on your ideas for what they’ll experience, you might be trying but you aren’t a user experience designer.

You don’t design for conditions and edge cases. If you map out best-case scenarios and how-we-want-it user flows, but don’t take the time to craft branches and escape hatches for alternative needs, user errors, system errors and general curiosity, you don’t understand people very well and you’re not a user experience designer.

You only think about the interface. If you’re focused exclusively on what the user sees and does on your website/mobile app/desktop app/kiosk/whatever, but never plan for how they’ll get there, what they’ll do when they leave, how they’ll come back, and most of all, how they’ll feel about it a week later, you’re a user interface designer, not a user experience designer. There’s a big difference.

I might sound like I’m contradicting myself

The above slide is from my presentation DIY UX: Give Your Users an Upgrade Without Calling in a Pro. So yes, I am partially to blame for this trend. But I didn’t really mean for people to start putting the title on their business cards and anointing themselves User Experience Designers without actually putting in the hard work.

The point of that slide in particular is to get people to realize that no matter what their role is, if they touch the outcome of the product in any way, shape, or form (as a designer, developer, copywriter, business analyst or marketer), they are ultimately affecting the user’s experience with the product, and as such, must take responsibility for doing right by them. This means learning who they are, listening to their needs, understanding their behaviors, and getting their feedback each step of the way. Otherwise you have no right to call yourself, or let your boss call you, what you’re not.

If you have the title of User Experience Designer and you want to do these things but aren’t being allowed to, don’t stand for it. Send the culprit this post if you’re feeling ballsy. Or let me know how I can help, either in the comments or via email. It’s one thing to claim to be something that you’re not just to be in vogue and make yourself more appealing to prospective employers; it’s another thing altogether to try doing the job and having roadblocks put in your way. What user experience designers do is honorable, compassionate, and valuable to businesses’ bottom line. When it’s actually practiced.

Sadly this is a common thing in the design area, but this isn’t happening only to UX.

I’ve just managed to insert a script in my site = I’m programmer.
I don’t like that green, it should be a happier green = I’m a designer.
I use productivity, management, team words = I’m a project manager.

And the list can be filled with hundreds of such examples.

Great article, though everyone that missed on point from your list is likely to start trolling.

Are you allowed to call yourself a User Experience designer if you don’t care about the user experience of your own blog on handheld devices? I tried reading this article on the bus home having seen it retweeted, and enjoyed the delicious irony of it not being particularly web friendly. Just saying – UX suffers from the same thing my profession does – people calling themselves designers with no real expertise, qualification or questioning from clients – but it’s strange to be concerned about the experience of computer interaction and not catch up with the boom in mobile web browsing on your own platform!

Thanks for the feedback, Ben. The site looks great and is quite readable on my BlackBerry and my iPhone, but yes I don’t yet have a mobile site (been too busy with client work, speaking gigs and writing — the old “cobbler’s children have no shoes” problem). Can you send me a screenshot of what you’re seeing? Thanks!

Couldn’t agree more. It’s key to recognize that people are experiencing things in physical space as they interact with our digital products. Our role is to consider the entirety of their existence — their environment and workflows and influences and distractions. It all factors into our design decisions, and without awareness of it we neglect to take it into account.

True!! Very true!!
But in contradiction I some how respect these ” You’re not a user experience designer ” guys too. They might be the not-at-all/semi/amateur/so-called UX designers but they also help to aware the clients that there is something called the UX. Just like the Pawn, which may be the weakest but most numerous, which can make it crowd and is helpful for awareness. But yes, they should call themselves UXDE (User Experience Design Enthusiast).

Great article. I’m glad you added that last part about not being allowed to actually design for user experience. I notice a lot of job postings calling for a “UX designer” but what they really want is a developer/coder. But who am I to tell them that in a job application?

I’m a UX designer if my company is too flippin’ cheap to hire a real one, and I’m forced to do everything from front to back-end.

I’m not sure if you’d be surprised, but it’s incredible how many companies expect their web application developers to also do the front-end. “Oh no! That’s ok, Mr. Employer. I really don’t have enough to do being an expert Java EE developer with experience in a variety of frameworks and databases, let me also handle the graphics and UI/UX. I’m sure it’s not that hard.”

This article was THE Guideline for me on how to pursue becoming a user experience designer.

I am an entrepreneur, have been working as a web producer/ development manager for last 7-8 years. Always been trying to make applications and websites that are smooth, fun and comfortable to use – along with this instinct, in recent times I figured out UX is what I need to learn. Seemed like my passion in life!

Sometime last year I was looking all around the web for directions/ suggestions on how to get rolling with UX. This article put me on the track:

– Read all the UX related blog posts by Whitney
– Read several books from ‘Whitney’s UX Bookshelf’ and still reading more

With some understanding gathered by reading great books such as – The Design of Everyday Things, Don’t Make Me Think, I took an online HCI course at Coursera.org (https://www.coursera.org/course/hci – class based on Prof. Scott Klemmer’s HCI course at Stanford University)

After doing all the above, now have even secured several UX consultancy work in Dhaka, Bangladesh – where I live and breathe. And gearing up for an MS in HCI @ Stanford/ Carnegie Mellon University.

As I had a great user experience myself in the processes of learning of UX, considering it was made so easy by Whitney – I added her to my list of ‘Inspirational People’ in my facebook. In my list, Whitney is next to Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Nobel prize winners like Dr. Yunus (from Bangladesh), Rabindranath Tagore.

UX is a happening thing – Whitney is THE GUY who can hook you up; and she is THE Man :-)

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